


Rivers

by eastern_wind



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Adaar Backstory, F/M, Tal-Vashoth, Tal-Vashoth Iron Bull
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-31 19:46:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13982043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eastern_wind/pseuds/eastern_wind
Summary: A lost child, a helping girl, a chained mage, a forgiving rebel, a savior and a killer. Or maybe the other way around?T'Aelin is every one of them.





	Rivers

Her relationship with Bull is just like Minanter, a mighty river she grew up looking at. It's tricky and bumpy and everchanging, it has a long history and quite enough turns to set those trying to understand it off the track.

_ It stretches through countries and somewhere it's broad and wast and dangerous, promising pain and suffering to all those caught in its currents. But there are times and places where it's slow moving and almost gentle, promising safety to the tired traveller. _

_ It starts in the middle of nowhere, a small creek hiding in the mountains of Tevinter outskirts. _

Or maybe it happens in Qunandar, a glimpse of a smile when a young but promising Ben-Hassrath boy meets a troubled tal-vashoth girl recently brought into Qun. It doesn't last though because small things are fragile and no one seem to notice them before they have already gone.

_ Minanter grows stronger and more hostile, widening where it crosses Orlais’ border. It’s water that's so much needed in these arid lands, but also devastation, floods and chaos when people try to tame it with dams. They dig up channels and build ponds to bend it to their will. Its flow weakens. _

T’Aelin grows uneasy and unable to hide the hate for the people who killed her family. She doesn't believe the words of tamassran because she never saw madness in her parents' eyes and the magic she used only to heal, the power she's been so carefully hiding from her captors, breaks free. They put her on a leash and sew her mouth shut, but never bring the qamek in, hoping to use her knowledge, so rare among saarebas, in their warfare. Ben-Hassrath man watches her with sadness and leaves for Seheron. T'Aelin is bred like a cattle under a watchful eye of tamassran, but never sees her child. They only want her power and for a time she succumbs to their greed.

_ Minanter endures. Creeping through steppes and thin forests it escapes to Nevarra and people meet her with open arms, freeing it from the clutches of Orlesian yoke. _

Seheron is a mess and arishok sends arvaraads to the island to use saarebas, their weapon, a change in the game. T’Aelin is among them, able healer, too useful during combat to be left behind. She sees the fight, feels the freedom when the hand of the fog warrior brushes her damaged lips, cutting the thread loose, and she doesn't endure anymore. She fights.

She stands against qunari, tall and weak and battered, closing the wounds of those who set her free and closing the airways of those who tried to break her. She kills, letting her magic crush chests and skulls, angry and defiant, but she cannot bring herself to finish off a dying Ben-Hassrath man who’d smiled at her and spoke with her in Trade, helping to understand his alien and unforgiving people those years ago. T’Aelin runs off and Ben-Hassrath man lives, feeling the poison leave his body at her command.

_ Minanter strives. Humans strengthen her banks but don't try to change her, never standing in the way of her flow. They build bridges and fish in her currents, never taking too much but just enough to live though the cold winter. _

Her scars are fading. T’Aelin lives, becoming a part of a people that saved her, becoming whole again. They teach her how to fight, they teach her how to smile and be free. She nearly falls in love, adopts an elvhen kid whose parents perished in one of the attacks, she lets her hair down and creates her first own weapon. She becomes a part of a family and when the new war comes she doesn't let her eyes linger on the Ben-Hassrath man that warily walks the streets of Seheron.

_ Minanter enters Free Marches and levels mountains with the power of her stream. She is wild and full and there's something else underneath, yet unknown. _

T’Aelin doesn't fear no ashaad, no sataareth and when they come for her people, she unleashes her wreath upon qunari. Some of them fall, some of them run, some of them call her “Katari” before the sharp of her glaive sinks in their chests. T’Aelin fights for those who cannot.

“So many things your kind have called me”, she tells Ben-Hassrath man, who is watching her with weary, resigned eyes. “I was vashoth to them, then I was qunari, then bas. But in the end, it all is just what your people see of me, not what I am.” She smiles and her long hair, white as the snow of the Vimmark mountains, billow in the air. He is the only one left alive and seems so ready to die that it stops her. Once again she is eleven and a Ben-Hassrath boy with a strange horns is looking at her, giving her a chance, only now it's him who is lost.

“Live”, she says, leaning on her glaive. Or is it “leave”? He can't quite hear it over the drumming in his ears and weakness of blood loss spreading through his body. “Of all the things your people have said about me the only one is true. I am a weapon. A means to fight and to protect. Follow us and you will perish. Let us go and you may live”.

He knows that he may die here on the orders of the Arishok, protecting those who may choose to kill him anyway. The woman before him? She would die to let them have this choice. Why?

He's broken and filled with a strange emotion burning him from the inside. For a second it feels like he wants to abandon this battlefield smeared with blood and gore of his own kind. He doesn't know anymore what is it he's fighting for. But she does, that’s why she’s stronger than him. He is so angry. He is so helpless.

“Go”, he growls, wanting it to stop, to not be, not be him. “Go, Adaar”.

“You have a heart, Hissrad”, she whispers, her form already blurred by a magical shield, allowing her to pass through smouldering flames of the burning city unharmed. “That’s why it hurts so much”. She vanishes. He falls to the ground near the body of a baker who tried to slit his throat with a knife, betraying the Qun. Why?

_ The waters of Minanter are calm and slow. They nearly still their movement during short winters and glow with ethereal beauty when seasons change. The river reaches out past Hasmal and Tantervale, curling around Starkhaven like a lazy cat, tempting unruly humans to dive in, searching for its nature treasures, hidden in between of the blackest deep ends. Not many come back to the surface, but those who do change forever. _

It takes time, but T’Aelin and her big and unusual family reach the shores of her homeland. Unable to live any other life except mercenary, they name themselves Valo-Kas and roam Free Marches under a watchful eye of their best. It takes years and, sadly, lives, but they manage and T’Aelin finally feels safe and loved and loving. She takes a stand in a human war that brings her to Conclave and leaves her with a glowing mark and a hole in the sky, but she takes it in stride and joins Inquisition. It seems like a right thing to do and her family knows it too.

She meets the Ben-Hassrath man with a strange horns again and his face is a mask, but his eyes tell her the truth: he’s still much more lost than found. He doesn't recognise her and T’Aelin doesn’t remind him. She has no weapon but her magic now, the glaive lost to the explosion and without it she’s just another tal-vashoth to him. At least until they arrive to Haven and blacksmith calls her to the forge.

“This is a fine glaive we’ve made, my lady” he says, and hands it to her. It seems like all eyes are on the sharp blade and a handle made of iron wood when she takes two small bells from her pocket and ties them to the tip of the glaive with a thin red thread. Then he knows and memories come at him like a tidal wave: a lost child, a helping girl, a chained mage, a forgiving rebel, a savior and a killer.

“Adaar” he whispers and she smiles at him, but her eyes are pained.

“That as well.” Humans, elves and gnomes around them look puzzled and only a young elvhen man, not older than seventeen, is suddenly at her side, nearly growling. Children grow so fast... She pays him no attention. “What will you do now, Hissrad?”

_ Minanter is raw and angry and fast, it’s waves holding so much power the navigation becomes not just a science, but a suicide mission. Still humans set their sails and manage to survive.   _

It takes time. The Ben-Hassrath man is battling his own demons. T’Aelin is sure Par Vollen wants her head on a pike for what Valo-Kas had done to the Seheron before even taking this name. He must be choosing between now or after the Breach is sealed, no doubt. Many qunari tried to kill her these past years, but none was the Ben-Hassrath man with a strange horns, so she survived and they did not.

Still, T’Aelin doesn’t run or hide. They go on the same missions, they battle the same demons side by side and she heals him while cutting off the heads of their enemies like it’s the rightest thing to do. She's not afraid to turn her back to him, she lets him decide. She lets him make a choice.

Some nights they speak. It’s hard and painful for both of them, because he never knew her family had been killed before qunari took her to Qunandar, never heard she had a child, never thought she ran because for her Qun is a slow death. Some nights they argue and she says she’d gladly rip the heart out of the chest of every qunari who thought they had the right to choose for her again. T’Aelin smiles sweet as ever and waits for him to tell her she is wrong, but he doesn’t. They sit in silence and something changes.

Qun knows, of course, that Hissrad did not slay the Katari. The killer. When time is right, they come for him with offer of Alliance, making him choose between his kin and his family. The anger rises in him again, blinding and horrific, but Gatt has no time to wait. The elf takes his chance to fulfill the orders and tries to remind Hissrad that his loyalties still lie with Qun, speaking in qunlat and blaming him for not killing the Adaar. Second later, he is dead, cut if halves by the broadsword and scorched by hellfire. A soft ring of bells is the only thing that fills the silence.

The Iron Bull watches silently as T’Aelin blows the horn. He doesn’t turn back when dreadnoughts burn and shatter with explosions. And there’s hate in him and passion and pain of betrayal and envy for her ability to make this choice.

_ Still people set their sails and manage to survive. Minanter is no god, but it prizes those who have enough courage to claim their right. _

Month pass, but the healing doesn’t come. The Iron Bull takes on his past comrades and let their bodies fall off the Skyhold battlements. He fights the dizziness and paranoia brought by qamek when gentle hands all covered in scars lie on his shoulders.

“What am I now?” he asks, trying to calm the shaking, but the answer doesn't come. Instead, a cool sensation embraces his body from toes to the tips of the horns, easing the pain. He sighs and stands up letting Adaar lead him to the citadel.

Halfway through the main hall she stops and turns to him, smiling softly as always. “When I was born, my parents had no name for me. So I just grew without it, not knowing what I am. They taught me much, but that I had to answer for myself.”

They stand in front of the throne, watching mosaic windows color the floor and walls in a earthy shades of green and brown. People mill around, not in the slightest bothered by two non-humans speaking in a hushed tones. They've come to know them and the Valo-Kas as the defenders and keepers, not just a band of mercenaries from the North. T’Aelin finds it acceptable.

“And did you, Adaar?” he asks, remembering the day he called her this for the first time. His fever is gone and with that fled the pain. The anger is still there, but it is much easier to contain. From underneath those feelings he can feel something else starts to emerge, slow and tentative.

“No”, she laughs, “This is not my name. A title, maybe. Along with others that people gave me through all this years. I mean the real name.” She hooks her hand through his and tugs him closer to the mosaic where all the Thedas is depicted in detail. “Like yours. The Iron Bull.” She chuckles slightly.

He watches the map too now, but doesn't understand her meaning. “What's funny?”

“One day I met a Ben-Hassrath boy with a strange horns. He smiled at me and gave me his hand. Come, he said, I'll show you around. He had the eyes of a liar, but the heart too big for his people. I didn't know then. I know now.”

He turns to see her face more clearly and she is not smiling anymore. In the dying light of evening sun her gray skin glows softly as she moves to face him.

“How so?” The answer suddenly seems so important to him, and as she leans in to his ear he closes his eyes.

“Because I saw what you've chosen that day on the Storm Coast, Bull. You've chosen with your heart. I did with mine too”. Her lips brush the tip of his ear, but the next moment she's already gone and her hand starts to uncurl from his, letting the coldness and the feeling of emptiness sink its teeth in him again. Like hypnotized Iron Bull follows her to the window pane, watching her finger trace a thin and uneven line of the river on the map.

“It's Minanter”, he says, “You were born somewhere close to it, so I heard.”

“Yes, two days by foot from Wycome”

“What does it have to do with everything?” Despite the strangeness of the situation, tal-vashoth finds that he enjoys the company of the mage. Her no nonsense attitude and the way of speaking always set his mind to work and this is what he needs right now.

“Humans sometimes say, when in strange lands, follow rivers. They are the veins of life. They will guide you.” She turns to him, beckoning closer and they're almost touching, standing in the crowded main hall hidden only by the shadow of the throne. “My parents were tal-vashoth, but they were smart. They've taught me languages good enough to know that elves call this river T’Aelin. I always loved the sound of it.”

“What does it mean?” Bull leans on the wall behind her, whispering to her ear now and feels the woman shiver. Whatever is going on between the two of them makes his blood sing with anticipation and he can feel Adaar’s breath hitch before she answers.

“Endurance. This is the name I chose and I give it to you freely.” They are now locked in a loose not-embrace and her hands slowly move up his chest, stopping where his heart is.

“Sounds fitting.” Their breath is mixing now and just before T'Aelin's lips gently touch Bull's, more of a promise than a real kiss, she whispers against them,

“If you ever feel lost and forget who you are, I will be your river.”

_ Minanter swirls and sways on its way through all the Thedas, finally meeting with the Ocean of Amaranthine and melting into its embrace forever changed and never alone.   _

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> If you liked it, please drop some feedback in the comments!


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